MOSCOW. Jan 15 (Interfax) - Investigators have finalized the criminal inquiry opened against former employee of the Russian Interior Ministry's anti-corruption department Dmitry Zakharchenko, who has been indicted on counts of bribery, and has forwarded the case to the Prosecutor General's Office, Russian Investigative Committee spokesperson Svetlana Petrenko said.
"The Russian Investigative Committee's main department for the investigation of high-profile crimes has completed the criminal inquiry against former police officer Dmitry Zakharchenko and some of his accomplices, Valery Markelov, Vasily Kritinin, and Viktor Belevtsov," Petrenko told journalists on Friday.
Depending on their roles, the defendants have been accused of taking bribes, mediating bribery, or giving bribes, she said.
"Investigators have gathered enough evidence, and the criminal case has been forwarded to the Russian Prosecutor General's Office, which will consider endorsing the bill of indictment," Petrenko said.
According to investigators, between 2007 and 2016, Zakharchenko "systematically received bribes from an organized group in control of a number of legal entities, which did not engage in genuine entrepreneurial activity, but used funds in bank accounts to accomplish illicit banking transactions to their benefit," she said.
"The group comprised businessmen Valery Markelov, Boris Usherovich, Ivan Stankevich, and Dmitry Motorin. Zakharchenko acted as their patron and helped rule out or minimize opportunities for detection of their criminal activity by the authorities," Petrenko said.
Zakharchenko used the services of his acquaintances, lawyer Viktor Belevtsov and Vasily Kritinin, to perpetrate the crimes.
"They mediated bribery and undertook other actions to assist Zakharchenko and his accomplices in the fulfillment of their criminal plans," Petrenko said.
Investigators also found that Zakharchenko took a bribe from a businessman working in the fuel and energy sector in 2015 in the form of "payment for accommodation at the Grand Hotel Polyana and Polyana 1389 Hotel and Spa in the Krasnodar Territory," she said.
"For his part, Zakharchenko undertook actions in his official capacity to the benefit of the briber and legal entities represented by him," Petrenko said.
In all, according to the Russian Investigative Committee, "Zakharchenko received more than 1.4 billion rubles in bribes over that period."
"Boris Usherovich, Ivan Stankevich, and Dmitry Motorin have been placed on the international wanted list," Petrenko said.
Zakharchenko was sentenced to 12.5 years in a high-security penitentiary and a fine of 118 million rubles and stripped of the rank of colonel in 2019 for obstructing justice and receiving a bribe in the form of a discount card, which he used to save three million rubles on meals at La Maree restaurants. The former policeman was acquitted of illegally receiving $800,000 with the right to have the charges expunged.
In 2020, Zakharchenko was charged with receiving about 1.5 billion rubles in bribes. He was moved from a penitentiary in Mordovia to Moscow in spring to study the materials in the new case. Since then, he has thrice been sent back to the penitentiary upon the expiration of his custodial period, but returned to Federal Detention Center No. 1 (Kremlin Central Prison) in Moscow without reaching the penitentiary.
The former colonel, who was arrested on September 10, 2016, has described the criminal cases opened against him as "fake."